I enjoyed this particular evening to myself as I re-watched “Dear John.” Have you ever watched this tear-jerker? If not, grab a box of Kleenexes because it is a heart grabber! My heart was filled with emotion after the movie and I began to reflect…
Letter after letter was written, each moment of life was shared with one another from a distance, and they had a strong felt love for one another… on the other hand, the journey grew tiresome, hard, and seemingly not worth it. While they had not fallen out of love with one another, they had fallen out of relationship. By falling out of relationship their was a brokenness amidst them, a brokenness that only forgiveness would eventually heal.
WOW… when I re-worked that in my head (the story line), the re-sounding theme was relationship and forgiveness. As we fill our hearts and minds with the Word of God, we are hearing His love letter to us. As we respond in prayer, we are writing a love letter to Him. I try to imagine the Lord anxiously awaiting my love letter to Him everyday, the kind of letter that I not only unload on Him about my days, but also where I praise Him through and through. I never want Him to think that another letter may not come, and that I may fall out of relationship with Him! Do you grow tired and weak sometimes and feel like it is just not worth it, just as Savannah did in the movie? It causes a broken feeling, as if we are not whole. I know that when I fail to seek Him and when I choose to be distracted by what my humanly flesh craves, I am left empty and broken.
Amidst that brokenness we can be made whole again. 
The Lord grants us forgiveness, forgiveness that is found only because He unconditionally loves us. It is a beautiful thing that in the middle of life’s turmoil, He still demands that He receives all glory and honor… and through our screw-ups and lack of focus on Him, He restores us through forgiveness! What a glorious promise to know that You can “… Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” Matthew 11:28-30
I challenge US this week to embrace that forgiveness and to extend it to others (especially the ones we love the most, they seem to be the hardest to forgive)!
Jessica
